“The first time I got sick in the van Papi was taking me to the library. Rafa was with us and he couldn’t believe I threw up. I was famous for my steel-lined stomach. A third-world childhood could give you that. Papi was worried enough that just as quick as Rafa could drop off the books we were on our way home.” (29)

at least your pops took you to the library, son.

“You’re the smart one, she said, suddenly happy with herself. Maybe you want to see my books?

They weren’t hers. I recognized them as ones my father must have left in her house. Papi was a voracious reader, couldn’t even go cheating without a paperback in his pocket.

Why don’t you go watch TV? Papi suggested. He was looking at her like she was the last piece of chicken on earth.” (36)

seriously. i wish this wasmydad. and it does bring to the forefront the fact of bringing your kids along on a booty call. seriously, what we’re exposed to as youts stays with us.

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4 thoughts on “drown-junot diaz”

from Drown:

“One teacher, whose family had two grammar schools named after it, compared us to the shuttles. A few of you are going to make it. Those are the orbiters. But the majority of you are just going to burn out. Going nowhere. He dropped his hand onto his desk. I could already see myself losing altitude, fading, the earth spread out beneath me, hard and bright.” (106)

“It would have broken my heart if it hadn’t been so damn familiar. I guess I’d gotten numb to that sort of thing. I had heart-leather like walruses got blubber.” (112)

“People like these were untouchables to me, raised on some other planet and then transplanted into my general vicinity to remind me how bad I was living.” (112)

“I used to think those were the barrio rules, Latinos and blacks in, whites out-a place we down cats weren’t supposed to go. But love teaches you. Clears your head of any rules. Loretta’s new boy was Italian, worked on Wall Street. When she told me about him we were still going out. We were on the Promenade and she said to me, I like him. He’s a hard worker.
No amount of heart-leather could stop something like that from hurting.” (114)

“Don’t panic. Say, Hey, no problem. Run a hand through your hair like the whiteboys do even though the only thing that runs easily through your hair is Africa.” (145)

“Either way don’t feel bad that you didn’t do anything. Never lose a fight on your first date or that will be the end of it.
Dinner will be tense. You are not good at talking to people you don’t know. A halfie will tell you that her parents met in the Movement, will say, Back then people thought it a radical thing to do. It will sound like something her parents made her memorize. Your brother once heard that one and said, Man, that sounds like a lot of Uncle Tomming to me. Don’t repeat this.” (146-7)